Never underestimate the power of the idiot to disprove the notion of idiot-proof.

Like the customer we dealt with who complained about the fragility of the camera we sold him (a Konica SLR).

Eventually we learned that he carried the camera in one of those aluminium suitcase/attaché type cases ....

....that for convenience had all the cushioning foam removed from it

Matt

“Photography is a complex and fluid medium, and its many factors are not applied in simple sequence. Rather, the process may be likened to the art of the juggler in keeping many balls in the air at one time!”

Ansel Adams, from the introduction to The Negative - The New Ansel Adams Photography Series / Book 2

Silly question, but aren't there more obscure formats than this still in production?

Originally Posted by bblhed

IMO, a lot of the things that APS did or at least tried to do might have been able to be done by 35mm stock with either a magnetic stripe on it (like APS has) or even optical imprinting on the rebate.

Yeah why didn't that ever happen, I had (well still have but it's Broken) an Olympus Stylus Epic DLX, the Stylus Epic to me stands as one of the reasons why APS failed, it was tiny, it had date imprinting, auto loading and a Panoramic mode. Now I thought the panoramic mode would use the data back to leave an instruction on the film that told the lab to print it like that, but no it was just two pieces of black plastic.

Last edited by ajuk; 06-02-2012 at 11:11 AM. Click to view previous post history.

Well some of it WAS fixed in 35mm. 35mm cameras did advance to the point where loading was "put the film in and close the back." I have a Stylus Zoom 140 I picked up at Goodwill for twelve bucks (I think it was) and that's it - put the film in, lay the leader across the back, and close the back. Loads automagically, rewinds automagically at the end of the roll. Sure it doesn't keep the negatives in the cartridge and all but most people who had trouble loading film also never used the negatives again and were quite content with the one or two sets of 4x6 prints they got the first time.